Understanding Cav.

in Shogun 2
Since the mainstay of units in shogun is spear infantry, cavalry always go in at
a disadvantage. Spears are brutal against horse, any attempt to engage in the r
each of yari units will result the untimely and complete destruction of your arm
y's most expensive unit. This imbalance is the difining factor of calvalry, and
your ablility to overcome your enemy's spears and other counters to cavalry will
define your cavalry's effectiveness.
Cav have 2 primary advantages:
1. Mobility
2. Charge
The mobility of cav allows them to be in places your opposition cannot react in
time for. This allows you to apply a decisive or damading force in a multitudeof
places.
Cav counters. An effecct of cavalry mobility is that your oppent has fewer optio
ns to counter. Since cav can outrun everything, what can the enemy do?
2 main things:
1: position discoragement -- or the charge of the light brigade
In a sentnace, position discoragemtn nullifies the strike options of your opposi
tion's cavalry through the positioning of more static forces. Forexample, a Yari
unit near your general, a musket unit behind your front line, ready to fire at
attacking cav, or clever use of terrain such as hills to nully charge bonus. The
most important thing to remember about positional defenses, is that they rely o
n mostly static elememnt that follow the logic: 'if this is here, your cav canno
t hurt me'. This is problamatic, because few things on even the total war battle
field are static. The enemies strategies and tactics can often remove or nullif
y the obstacle, and then their cav are given free reign.
2: cavalry skirmishes:
In military history, some of the most violent clashes involve cavalry vs. cavalr
y. The reason for this is that the most straight forward answer to the mobility
of the enemy, is the mobility of your force. THis especially comes into play whe
n cav has negated the enemies positional defenses, leaving the only response to
their mobility your mobile forces. This small scale battle can have signifigant
impact on the rest of the combat, sometimes determining the enitre engagement. A
n important aspect to cav skirmishes, is that when near equal forces fight an th
e skirmish ends with out a discive winner, both sides will simutanoulsy win and
lose. By weaking their cav force, you destroy their options and stratigical posi
tion. This means that cav skirmishes are sometimes stratigically wise even when
your own cavalry is completely desstroyed.
everything from their general to artilery and skirmishers can be decimated and
removed by the correct appplication of cavalry.
Cav objectives. Or what your cav can d